been many, many cycles since they have taken Callistonians captive. They kill us at
every opportunity. Is it your custom to destroy yourselves in a situation such as this ?”
“It is not. While we live there is hope.”
“Nor ours. Unless they have made enormous strides in psychological
mechanisms they cannot tear from our minds any secrets we really wish to keep. That
is useless,” he went on, as King lifted a hand-weapon. “You will have no opportunity
whatever to use it,” and he was right.
A searing beam of energy drove them out of the vessel, then electromagnetic
waves burned every metallic object out of their possession. Burning rays herded them
into the hexan sphere and into a small room, whose door clanged shut behind them.
“Ah, two are humans of a strange breed!” a snarling voice barked from the wall,
in the Callistonian language. “Our deductions were accurate, as usual—it is to the
humans of Planet Three, whose bodies are a trifle less puny than those of the humanity
of the satellites, that we owe our recent reverses. However, those reverses were merely
temporary—humanity, no matter what its breed, shall very shortly disappear from the
satellites. Now, you scum of the Solar System, you shall be permitted to witness an
entrancing spectacle on the way to our headquarters, where all your knowledge is to be
taken from you before you die, lingeringly and horribly. There is a strange space-vessel
nearing us, probably searching for the one we took and which you dogs of Callisto must
have been fortunate enough to take from us before we could study and kill its human
cargo. Watch its destruction and cringe—and know, in your suffering, that the more you
suffer, the greater shall be our enjoyment.”
“I believe that,” King acknowledged. As all three prisoners stared at the wall-
screen, upon which was pictured a huge football of scarred gray steel, Czuv was
amazed to see the faces of Breckenridge and King light up with fierce smiles of
pleasure and anticipation.
“You dissemble well,” remarked the Callistonian. “That will rob them of much
pleasure.”
“They’ll get robbed of more than that,” King returned. “This is too good to keep,
and since they cannot understand English, I’ll tell you something. I told you about
Stevens. He apparently wasn’t killed, as we thought. He must have escaped, and there
is the result. That ship there is far from innocent—her being so far out of range of any of
our power-plants proves that. That vessel is the Sirius—the research laboratory of the
IPC—the Inter-Planetary Corporation! It carries the greatest scientific minds of three of
the inner planets, and it is loaded with pure poison or it wouldn’t be here. Oh, you
hexans, what you have got coming to you!”
CHAPTER 9
The “Sirius” Takes a Hand
The inter-planetary vessel Sirius loafed along at normal acceleration just outside the
orbit of Mars and a million miles north of the ecliptic plane. In the control room, which
had been transformed into a bewilderingly complete laboratory, Norman Brandon strode
up and down, waving his arms, his unruly black hair on end, addressing savagely his
friend and fellow-scientist, who sat unmoved and at ease.
“For Cat’s sake, Quince, let’s get busy! They’re outside somewhere, since the
police have scoured every cubic kilometer within range of the power plants without
finding a trace of them. We’ve got the power question licked right now—with these fields
we can draw sixty thousand kilo-franks from cosmic radiation, which is lots more than
we’ll ever need. We haven’t drawn a frank from a plant in a month, and we’ve had to cut
our field strength down to a whisper to keep from burning out our accumulators. We can
hunt as far as Neptune easy—we can go to Alpha Centauri if we want to. This thing of
piffling and monkeying around here’s pulling my cork, and for the ten thousand four
hundred and sixty seventh time I say LET’S PROWL, and PROWL NOW! In fact, I’m
getting so sick of sticking around doing nothing that I’m going out anyway, if I have to go
alone in a lifeboat!”
Impetuous and violent as Brandon had always been, never before had he gone
to such lengths as to suggest a disruption of the partnership; and Westfall, knowing that
Brandon in his most violent moments never threatened idly, thought long before he
replied.
“You will not go alone, of course. If you insist upon going without further
preparation I will go too, no matter how foolish I think such a course to be. We have
power, it is true, but in all other respects we are in no condition to meet an opponent
having command of such resources as must certainly be possessed by those who
attacked the Arcturus. Our detectors are inefficient, our system of vision is crude, to say
the least, and many other things are still in the experimental stage. We have not the
slightest idea whom or what we may encounter. It is all too probable that we would
simply be throwing away uselessly the lives of more good men. It is also foolish from a
general viewpoint, for as you already know, we and our assistants happen to be in
better position to study these things than is any one else at the present time. However, I
will compromise with you. We can learn much in a month if you will really try, instead of
wasting time in fuming around the ship and indulging in these idiotic tantrums. If you will
buckle down and really study the problems confronting us for thirty days, we will set out
at the end of that time, ready or not.”
“All x. I hate to do it, but we’ve been together too long to bust it up now,” and
Brandon turned toward his bench. Scarcely had he reached it when a series of dots and
dashes roared from an amplifier. Both men leaped for the receiver which had so
unexpectedly burst into sound, reaching it just as it relapsed into silence, and from the
tape of the recorder they read the brief message.
“. . . h four seven ganymede point oh four seve . . .”
“That’s Steve!” yelled Brandon. “Nobody else could build an ultra-sender!
Direction ?”
“No need of calculating distance or direction. Ganymede is the third major
satellite of Jupiter.”
“Sure. Of course, Quince—never thought of that. Dope enough—point oh four
seven.”
As Stevens had told Nadia, the message was completely informing to those for
whom it was intended, and soon Brandon’s answer was flying toward that distant
satellite. He then started to call the offices of the Inter-Planetary Corporation, but was
restrained by his conservative friend.
“It would be better to wait a while, Norman. In a few hours we will know what to
tell them.”
At high acceleration the Sirius drove toward the Jupiter-Earth-North plane, and
Brandon calculated from his own bearings and from the current “Ephemeris” the time at
which Stevens’ reply should be received. Two minutes before that time he was pacing
up and down in front of the ultra-receiver, and fifteen seconds after it he snapped:
“Come on, Perce, get busy! Shake a leg!”
“Oh, come, Norman; give him a few minutes leeway, at least,” said Westfall, with
amused tolerance. “Even if your calculations are that accurate—which of course they
are,” he added hastily at a stormy glance from hot black eyes, “since we received that
message direct, instead of through one of our relay stations, Stevens probably has been
throwing it around for hours, or perhaps days, looking for us, and the shock of hearing
from us at last might well have put him out of control for a minute or two.”
The carrier wave hissed into the receiver, forestalling Brandon’s fiery reply,
followed closely by the code signals they had been expecting. As soon as the story had
been told, and while Brandon was absorbed in the scientific addenda of Stevens,
Westfall thoughtfully called Newton.
“Nadia is alive, free, safe, well, and happy,” he shot out without preliminary or
greeting, as soon as the now lined features of the director showed upon the
communicator screen, and the careworn countenance smoothed magically into the keen
face of the fighting Newton of old as Westfall recounted rapidly the tale of the
castaways.
“They apparently have not suffered in any way,” he concluded. “All that Stevens
wants is some cigarettes, and your daughter’s needs, while somewhat more numerous
than his, seem to be only clothes, powder, perfume, and candy. Therefore we need not
worry about them. The fate of the others is still unknown, but there seems to be a slight
possibility that some of them may yet be rescued. You may release as much or as little
of this story as may seem desirable. Stevens is still sending data of a highly technical
nature. We shall arrive there at 21:32 next Tuesday.”
In due time the message from Ganymede ended and Brandon, with many pages